“What we call fierce conversations, courageous conversations and bravery come into play and you never want to know that what your institution has been working on is not working for all kids,” says Hayes.

Superintendent Pedro Martinez say one reason for the achievement gap is a form of untended discrimination.

“We over discipline our children that are for example African American, Latinos that are English language learners that are special education.”

So, while minority student misbehavior is punished, white kids who misbehave are presumed to be bored and given advanced placement. As a result white students account for 61-percent of advance placement and hispanic students only 24-percent.

New data from the Washoe County School District is showing significant gaps in achievement by gender and race. The data show minorities have low achievement in the double digits by third grade. The district has discussed the information internally for years, but is releasing it to the public for the first time to begin a difficult conversation says Chief Accountability Officer Ben Hayes.

“We know that there are institutional problems with access we know that we have to begin earlier on in the pathway and to be honest we know that we are not doing as well as we should be in some areas.”

He points to a double standard that he says is common across the country. Minorities, males in particular, are often punished for misbehaving while white students who misbehave are put in advanced placement. The district is working on a new strategic and identifying ways to help minorities. Washoe County is using St. Paul as a model. It has higher expectations for students, all teachers are qualified to teach english as a second language and there is a high teacher to student ratio.

Sacramento State is among three CSU campuses getting a combined total of more than $8 million in federal grants to enhance teacher diversity. The goal is to recruit teachers in Latino, African American and other minority communities.

More California high school students are taking college-level Advanced Placement tests. AP exams are taken each May by high school students who've attended classes that are roughly equivalent to undergraduate college courses.

The Sacramento area unemployment rate increased last month. July's jobless rate was 5.2 percent, up from 4.8 percent in June. Analysts with the state Employment Development Department attribute the increase to seasonal cutbacks at schools.